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Professional dominatrix Madelaine Thomas embodies not at all your average startup entrepreneur. Following repeated instances of individuals leaking her intimate photographs, she was "angry enough to do something about it" and turned to technology for answers.

"Those were beautiful pictures, I'm unapologetic of the photographs, I'm embarrassed of the manner that they were weaponized by someone who I have never met," explained Madelaine.

Just over a year since founding her company, Image Angel, which employs covert digital tracking to track perpetrators, has garnered significant recognition and was recommended as best practice in an government-commissioned study recently.

This marks quite a departure from her previous career in providing consensual sexual encounters, dominating clients in the realms of kink and bondage.

A Widespread Issue

Intimate image abuse, commonly known as revenge porn, is a criminal offence with offenders facing up to two years in prison.

It is far from an issue uniquely experienced by those in the sex industry. A study suggests that approximately 1.42% of the women in the UK is affected by this form of abuse on an annual basis.

Madelaine, 37, said victims lived with feelings of humiliation. "In my view a lot of people will say, 'you shared a saucy picture out on the internet, what do you anticipate?'," she noted.

"I expect respect, I expect consideration, and I expect trust, and I don't see why those are negotiable," she continued. "The reality that those images could be subsequently distributed in my community or with people I love and employed to cause them pain, that's beyond, that's not my choice, that's not my mistake, that's an individual committing abuse."

An Unconventional Path

Madelaine has been working as a professional dominatrix, primarily online, for a decade and consistently found her work liberating and satisfying. "I am as a dominant woman, a woman who is confident and powerful, giving my body as a gift to someone of my own volition," she described.

"People think it's unusual but I view it similarly to a personal trainer or an financial advisor providing a service," she remarked.

She embraces being something of an anomaly in the world of tech. "I understand that it's bizarre, it's remarkable to think that someone who was a dominatrix is now a founder of a tech company, but it took someone who has been through it to understand the loopholes and the changes that were necessary," she stated.

She insisted she was not technically inclined and was able to build her company after a lot of late nights, investigation and "bugging people" who understand tech.

How Does the Technology Work?

Image Angel can be used by any online platform where people share images, for instance dating apps, social networks and online sites.

When an image is accessed by a user, it is seamlessly tagged with an undetectable digital marker which is specific to that viewer.

This invisible watermark is embedded into the copy of the image itself and can survive screen shots, being edited and being photographed with a different camera.

It ensures that if you find out your image has been shared without your consent, as long as the platform you used has the technology embedded, the sharer's information will be hidden within the image and can be retrieved by a data recovery specialist so legal steps can follow.

To date, one platform has implemented her tech and she's in talks with several more.

Proven Technology, New Application

"This technology already exists in Hollywood, it already exists in live television so this is not an untested concept, it's just a new application and a new system," explained Madelaine.

"We have validated it, we're partnering with a firm that has decades of expertise in developing technology so we know that this is solid and what we now need to do is deploy it widely," she added.

She said she hoped the technology would also act as a deterrent to potential intimate image abusers.

Removing Stigma, Shifting Blame

An expert from a support service commented she had seen first-hand the trauma and guilt intimate image abuse inflicted on victims.

"When that guilt is reinforced by a misinformed friend or professional who says 'what did you expect?' that self blame can really be deepened so it's really important that the response a victim receives is that they have committed no error," she stated.

She noted it was fantastic that Madelaine was leveraging her ordeal to create solutions, adding: "It is really important to have this multi-layered approach towards tackling tech facilitated gender-based abuse, because a single solution is going to be able to solve this problem, no one helpline, it needs to be this integrated effort."

TV presenter Jess Davies was just 15 when images of her in a state of undress were shared around her local community. It was the first of several incidents Jess experienced in her teens and 20s that would later shape her women's rights campaigning.

"It required years, an excessive amount of time for someone to tell me, 'it wasn't your fault' and 'that shouldn't have happened'," said Jess.

She too is passionate about eliminating the shame of intimate image abuse from the victims to the perpetrators. "There is no offence to willingly share an image to someone," said Jess.

"However, it is illegal to distribute that without consent and I think that should invariably be where the blame is," she concluded.